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| Mama Too Tight |
| Archie Shepp |
első megjelenés éve: 1966
38 perc |
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| (1996)
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CD |
| 3.923 Ft
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| 1. | A Portrait Of Robert Thompson: A. Prelude To A Kiss/B. The Break Strain-King Cotton/C. Dem Basses
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| 2. | Mama Too Tight
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| 3. | Theme For Ernie
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| 4. | Basheer
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Jazz / Avant-Garde, Free Jazz, Avant-Garde Jazz
Recorded at the Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey on August 19, 1966
Digitally remastered by Erick Labson at MCA Music Media Studios.
Archie Shepp (tenor saxophone); Tommy Turrentine (trumpet); Grachan Moncur III, Roswell Rudd (trombone); Howard Johnson (tuba); Perry Robinson (clarinet); Charlie Haden (bass); Beaver Harris (drums)
MAMA TOO TIGHT was the fourth and most radical of the albums Archie Shepp recorded for Impulse in the sixties. Overseeing an octet made up of 2 trombones, tuba, clarinet, trumpet, bass and drums as well as his own tenor, Shepp pays homage to Duke Ellington and James Brown in his witty, colorful writing for brass/reeds and funky ensemble work (cf. the title track.) The extended free-form opening of the massive side-long "A Portrait Of Robert Thompson (As A Young Man)" leaves a slightly different impression however. Here Shepp enters the raucous free space previously occupied by Albert Ayler and Coltrane's ASCENSION.
The relentless hard blowing can be overwhelming so it is a relief when the gentler strains of Ellington's "Prelude To A Kiss" enter, followed by a comical but sharp version of "The Break Strain-King Cotton" march. Shepp had the best sense of humor of any modern jazz player and it is displayed brilliantly in the shifts and juxtapositions of "Robert Thompson" and the closing "Basheer," a slightly less ambitious tone poem. The 20 bit re-mastering job allows Shepp's breathy, gritty tenor saxophone work to shine.
(from towerrecords.com)
Producer: Bob Thiele.
Reissue producer: Michael Cuscuna.
Originally issued as Impulse AS-9134.
This is part of Impulse's The New Thing series.
The octet Archie Shepp surrounded himself with in 1966 was filled with new and old faces. The twin trombones of Roswell Rudd and Grachan Moncur III embodied this, but so did bassist Charlie Haden and trumpeter Tommy Turrentine, while familiar figures like drummer Beaver Harris and tubaist Howard Johnson had been part of Shepp's regular band. There are four tracks on Mama Too Tight, all of them in some way acting as extensions of the opening three-part suite, "A Portrait of Robert Thomson (As a Young Man)." Shepp had hit his stride here compositionally. The track is, at first, a seeming free jazz blowout, but then traces the history of jazz, gospel, and blues through its three sections. Certainly there is plenty of atonality, but there is plenty of harmonic and rhythmic invention too. The piece, almost 19 minutes in length, has an intricate architecture that uses foreshadowing techniques and complex resolution methods. The title track is a post-bop blues swinger with a killer front-line riff turning in and out as the trombones go head to head. And finally, "Basheer," with its Eastern modality that transposes itself toward blues and folk music, becomes a statement on the transitional ties the '60s were ushering in musically. Here again, lots of free blowing, angry bursts of energy, and shouts of pure revelry are balanced with Ellingtonian elegance and restraint that was considerable enough to let the lyric line float through and encourage more improvisation. This is Shepp at his level best. ~ Thom Jurek, All Music Guide
Archie Shepp
Active Decades: '60s, '70s, '80s, '90s and '00s
Born: May 24, 1937 in Fort Lauderdale, FL
Genre: Jazz
Styles: Poetry, Progressive Big Band, Ballads, Hard Bop, Early Creative, Free Jazz, Mainstream Jazz, Progressive Jazz, Standards, Avant-Garde Jazz
Archie Shepp has been at various times a feared firebrand and radical, soulful throwback and contemplative veteran. He was viewed in the '60s as perhaps the most articulate and disturbing member of the free generation, a published playwright willing to speak on the record in unsparing, explicit fashion about social injustice and the anger and rage he felt. His tenor sax solos were searing, harsh, and unrelenting, played with a vivid intensity. But in the '70s, Shepp employed a fatback/swing-based R&B approach, and in the '80s he mixed straight bebop, ballads, and blues pieces displaying little of the fury and fire from his earlier days. Shepp studied dramatic literature at Goddard College, earning his degree in 1959. He played alto sax in dance bands and sought theatrical work in New York. But Shepp switched to tenor, playing in several free jazz bands. He worked with Cecil Taylor, co-led groups with Bill Dixon and played in the New York Contemporary Five with Don Cherry and John Tchicai. He led his own bands in the mid-'60s with Roswell Rudd, Bobby Hutcherson, Beaver Harris, and Grachan Moncur III. His Impulse albums included poetry readings and quotes from James Baldwin and Malcolm X. Shepp's releases sought to paint an aural picture of African-American life, and included compositions based on incidents like Attica or folk sayings. He also produced plays in New York, among them The Communist in 1965 and Lady Day: A Musical Tragedy in 1972 with trumpeter/composer Cal Massey. But starting in the late '60s, the rhetoric was toned down and the anger began to disappear from Shepp's albums. He substituted a more celebratory, and at times reflective attitude. Shepp turned to academia in the late '60s, teaching at SUNY in Buffalo, then the University of Massachusetts. He was named an associate professor there in 1978. Shepp toured and recorded extensively in Europe during the '80s, cutting some fine albums with Horace Parlan, Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, and Jasper van't Hof. Shepp continued to tour and record throughout the '90s and '00s. Moving from provocative free-jazz icon in his youth to elder jazz journeyman in his latter years, Shepp has appeared on a variety of labels over the years including Impulse, Byg, AristaFreedom, Phonogram, Steeplechase, Denon, Enja, EPM, and Soul Note.
---Ron Wynn & Scott Yanow, All Music Guide |
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